For almost 40 years I’ve been a Republican. Most of it as a not-very-proud Republican.

It would be easy to say I became a Republican because my dad was a Republican. But it is better to say that my dad was a businessman and a fiercely-proud Greek immigrant / naturalized American citizen. Back when I first registered to vote… and my dad before me… the Republican party was the party of business and opportunity.

Not any more.

Today it’s the party of whatever-you-want-to-be-extreme-about… and most concerningly, about stuff that simply hijacks the important governing issues of the day.

Yes, I know, some of these issues are actually important.

But, as we’re fiddling, Rome is burning. There has to be perspective and priorities. We want the patient to live. So, air first. Then water. And so on. This appears to be lost on the collective we call the Republican Party these last few elections.

I wish there was a “Moderate” Party (coined by my friend Mike Rubin). Not too far to the right… or left… mostly inspired by down-the-middle common sense.

And trust.

Given the candidates the Republican Party has presented in the last few years — ahem, decades — I simply don’t trust the Republican Party to represent what I believe any longer: That we should run ourselves responsibly. That we should live and let live.

Fiscally conservative. Socially liberal.

In the past, I was able to look past a candidate — a party — I didn’t agree with. I simply withheld my Republican vote.

Sadly I’ve been doing that for a long time.

I can’t do that any longer.

Not when I have ideological issues AND now also feel like I have to fact-check every word coming out of the best-the-Republican-Party-can-do candidate’s mouth… that is, when I’m not cringing from his immature mud-slinging.

So, because there isn’t a Moderate Party…

… today I became an independent.

I will now vote for what I think is best.

Maybe that will, in fact, be a Republican. Maybe not. But I am making a conscious decision not to vote along party lines… because I no longer agree with a lot of the party lines… nor trust the candidate chosen to represent those lines.

40 years of political affiliation… changed in about three minutes online.